page_title: Reihengräber culture
section_title: Material culture
hierarchical_section_title: Reihengräber culture / Material culture
caption_attribution_description: English: Francisca, which is on display in the Romano-Germanic Museum in Cologne, Germany.
context_page_description: The Reihengräber culture is an archaeological culture that refers to the burial practice of regularly arranged, identically orientated inhumation graves between the mid-fifth and early-eight century in central and western Europe. Existing within the Merovingian sphere of influence, the Reihengräber culture was dominant in modern Belgium, northern France and the Rhineland, and developed from a blending of Gallic and Scandinavian cultures in the late-Roman to early-medieval period. Though the relevance of the Reihengräber culture in outlining the complex ethnic, political and cultural context of 5ᵗʰ-7ᵗʰ century Europe has been questioned, similarities in material culture development within the Reihengräber region outline the existence of Kerngebiet, or core areas of cultural unity and development, within Germanic territories during Merovingian rule.
context_section_description: The material culture of the Reihengräber reveals distinctions between male and female burial practices. Male graves typically contain swords, axes and belts, whereas female graves largely contained brooches, necklaces and girdle hangers. Bronze conical helmets in the Reihengräber culture are also prevalent, and are especially of note as they were offered as funerary objects within the late-iron age. Animistic designs occur extensively throughout Reihengräber material culture, in particular bird-like iconography and shapes of Thuringian bow brooches. Late fifth century Thuringian graves in modern Scherzheim also contained  sets of Zierschlusselpaare, or symbolic keys pairs, uncommon artefacts whose ritual significance is yet unknown.
  Another common item is the biconical pot, (German: Knickwandtopf, Dutch: Knikwandpot, and French: Vase biconique), the most important type of ceramics from the Merovingian period. The name is derived from the shape of the vessel, the form looking like two cones on top of each other. Often, the outside of the pot is decorated with stamps, impressions or lines. The distribution of the pottery shows that these vases originate from different ceramic production sites. Biconical pots are also found in settlements.
caption: Fransica throwing axe on display in the Romano-Germanic Museum in Cologne, Germany
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot A470", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS3 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2010:07:29 23:33:47", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "228", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1150", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4954", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/8", "EXIF FNumber": "3", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "200", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2010:04:21 17:56:25", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2010:04:21 17:56:25", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "5", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "3", "EXIF ApertureValue": "101/32", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "101/32", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "63/10", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "400", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "304", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "3072", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "2304", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1000", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "96000/7", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "96000/7", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}